Courtenay was mistaken in thinking that the savages sought a parley. The canoe was paddled by two women; they changed its course with a dexterous twist of the blades when within a cable’s length of the ship, and then circled slowly round her. The four men jabbered in astonishingly loud voices. Suarez, who gathered the purport of their talk, explained that they were discussing the best method of attack.

“The three younger men belong to the tribe which I lived with,” he said. “The old man sitting between the women is a stranger. I think he must have come from the north of the island with some of his friends, attracted by the smoke signals.”

“From the north? Is there a road?” asked Courtenay, when he learnt what Suarez was saying.

“He would arrive in a canoe,” was the answer. “The Indians venture out to sea in very bad weather. He probably passed the ship late last night, and, now I come to think of it, the canoe which you captured is not familiar to me, whereas I know by sight every craft owned by the Feathered People.”

“How many do they possess?”

“Twenty-three.”

These statements were disconcerting. Not only was it possible for the natives to surround the Kansas with a whole swarm of men, but the mere number of their boats would render it exceedingly difficult to repel a combined assault. And nothing could be more truculent than the demeanor of the semi-nude warriors. They pointed at each person they saw on the decks, and made a tremendous row when they passed the canoe fastened alongside. Despite their keen sight, they evidently did not recognize Suarez, who now wore a cap and a suit of clothes taken from the locker of one of the missing stewards, while his appearance was so altered otherwise that even the people on board found it difficult to regard him as the monstrous-looking wizard whom they had dragged out of the water some twelve hours earlier.

The impudence of the Indians exasperated Courtenay. The sheer size of the Kansas should have awed them, he thought.

“I wish they had left their women behind,” he muttered. “If the men were alone, an ounce or two of buck-shot would soon teach them to keep their distance.”

“Perhaps they are aware of the danger of boarding a ship which stands so high above the sea as the Kansas,” said Christobal. “Why not fire a couple of rounds of blank cartridge at them?”

“Worst thing you can do,” said Tollemache.

“But why?”

“They would be sure, then, you could not hurt them. If you shoot, shoot straight, with the heaviest shot you possess.”

At that moment the rowers permitted the canoe to swing round with the tide. One of the men stood up, and Elsie, who seized the chance of snap-shotting the party, ran to the upper deck, so she did not overhear Courtenay’s smothered ejaculation. He was scrutinizing the savages through his glasses, and he had distinctly seen the ship’s name painted on a small water-cask on which the Indian had been sitting. Tollemache made the same dramatic discovery.

“Out of one of the ship’s life-boats, I suppose?” he said in a low tone to the captain.

“Yes. Did you see the number?”

“Number 3, I think.”

“I agree with you. That was the first life-boat which got away.”

Christobal, startled out of his wonted sang-froid, whispered in his turn:

“Do you mean to say that one of the boats has fallen into the hands of these fiends?”

“I am afraid so,” replied Courtenay. “Of course, that particular keg may have drifted ashore. In any case, it tells the fate of one section of the mutineers. Either the boat is swamped, or the crew are now on the island, and we know what that signifies.”

“Is there no chance of bribing these people into friendliness, or, at least, into a temporary truce?”

“It is hard to decide. Tollemache and Suarez are best able to form an opinion. What do you say, Tollemache?”

“Not a bit of use; they are insatiable. The more you give the more they want. The only way to deal with those rotters is to stir them up with a Gatling or a twelve-pounder.”

Suarez, when appealed to, shook his head.

“Last winter,” he said, “the man sitting aft, he with the single albatross feather sticking in his hair, seized his own son, aged six, and dashed his brains out on the rocks because the little fellow dropped a basket of sea-eggs he was carrying. The woman nearest to him is his wife, and she raised no protest. You might as well try to fondle a hungry puma. I am the only man they have ever spared, and they spared me solely because they thought I gave them power over their enemies. If you had a cannon, you might drive them off. As it is, we shall be compelled to fight for our lives; they are brave enough in their own way.”

The experience of the miner from Argentina was not to be gainsaid. The predicament of the giant Kansas—inert, immovable, lying in that peaceful bay at the mercy of a horde of painted savages—was one of the strange facts almost beyond credence which men encounter at times in the byways of life. It reminded Courtenay of a visit he paid to the crocodile tank at Karachi when he was a midshipman on the Boadicea. He noticed that some of the huge saurians, eighteen feet in length and covered with scale armor off which a bullet would glance, were squirming uneasily, and the Hindu attendant told him that they had been bitten by mosquitoes!

He laughed quietly, but his mirth had a curious ring in it which boded ill for certain unknown members of the Alaculof tribe when the threatened tussle came to close quarters. Elsie heard him. Leaning over the rails of the spar deck, she asked cheerfully:

“What is the joke, Captain Courtenay? And why don’t the Indians come nearer? Are they timid? They don’t look it.”

He glanced up at her. If aught were needed to complete the contrast between civilization and savagery it was given by the comparison which the girl offered to the women in the canoe. The hot sun and the absence of wind had changed the temperature from winter to summer. After breakfast, Elsie had donned a muslin dress, and a broad-brimmed straw hat. Exposure to the weather had bronzed her skin to a delightful tint. Her nut-brown hair framed a sweetly pretty face, and her clear blue eyes and red lips, slightly parted, smiled bewitchingly at the men beneath. The camera in her hands added a holiday aspect to her appearance, an aspect which was unutterably disquieting in its relation to the muttered forebodings she had broken in on.

But Courtenay’s voice gave no hint of the tumult in his breast, though some malign spirit seemed to whisper the agonizing question: “Will you permit her to fall into the hands of the ghouls waiting without?”

“I find the get-up of our visitors distinctly humorous,” he said, “and I hope they are a bit scared of us. We would prefer their room to their company.”

“I thought that SeÑor Suarez would hail them, as he can speak their language. Perhaps he does not wish them to know he is on board?”

Now, Elsie had heard the man’s impassioned appeal when the Indians were first sighted, so Courtenay felt that she, too, was acting.

“You look nice and cool up there,” he answered, “and your words do not belie your looks.”

“Please, what does that mean exactly?”

“Need I tell you? You treat our troubles airily.”

“Shall one ‘wear a rough garment to deceive’?” she quoted with a laugh. “Don’t you remember the next verse? You ought to retort: ‘I am no prophet, I am an husbandman!’ But that would not be quite right, for you are a sailor.”

She blushed a little at the chance turn of the phrase. Neither the girl nor her hearers recalled the succeeding verses, wherein the destruction of Jerusalem is foretold: “And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried.”

Indeed, a new direction was given to Elsie’s thoughts by the somewhat scowling aspect of Christobal’s face. He was looking at Courtenay in a manner which betokened a certain displeasure. The Spaniard’s cultivated cynicism was subjugated by a more powerful sentiment. It seemed to Elsie that he envied Courtenay his youth and high spirits, for, in very truth, the mere exchange of those harmless pleasantries had tuned the younger man’s soul to the transcendental pitch of the knight errant. In his heart he was vowing to rescue this fair lady from the dangers which beset her, though he said jokingly with his lips:

“If a husbandman has to do with a tiller I may claim some expert knowledge, Miss Maxwell.”

Elsie dared not meet his eyes; a flood of understanding had suddenly poured its miraculous waters over her. Incidents unimportant in themselves, utterances which seemed to have no veiled intent at the time, rushed in upon her with overwhelming conviction. Christobal suspected her of flirting with Courtenay, and disapproved of it as strongly as she herself had condemned Isobel’s admitted efforts in the same direction. Though not a little dismayed, she resolved to carry the war into the enemy’s territory.

“Why are you looking so glum, Dr. Christobal?” she demanded. “Has the captain’s quip given you a shock, or is it that you are surprised at my levity?”

“I am neither shocked nor surprised, Miss Maxwell. I have not lived fifty years in this Vale of Tears without being prepared for the unexpected.”

“Does that imply that you are disillusioned?”

“By no means. My heart is amazingly young. ‘There is no fool like an old fool,’ you know.”

“Oh, please don’t speak of age in that way. You are far from being an antiquity. Why, within the past twenty-four hours I have come to look on you as a sort of elder brother, who can be indulgent even while he chides.”

Courtenay found himself wondering what had caused this flash of rapiers. But, so far as he was concerned, the proceedings of the Indians put a stop to any further share in the conversation. The canoe had drifted closer to the ship. It was about eighty yards distant when the Indian who was on his feet suddenly whirled a sling, and sent a stone crashing through the window of the music-room. The heavy missile, which, when picked up, was found to weigh nearly half a pound, just missed Tollemache, who was the first to take note of the sharp warning given by Suarez, but failed, nevertheless, to dodge quickly enough.

The captain raised a double-barreled fowling-piece, the only gun on board, and fired point blank at the savages. But the women were paddling away vigorously, and the shot splashed in the water on all sides of the canoe, though a howl and a series of violent contortions showed that one, at least, of the pellets had stung the wizened Indian whom Suarez believed to be a newcomer.

There was no second shot—cartridges were too precious to be wasted at an impossible range—but the undeniable fact remained that the Indians meant to be aggressive. For a little time no one spoke. They heard the echoes of the gunshot faintly thrown back by the nearest wall of rock; the regular plash of the paddles as the canoe sped shorewards was distinctly audible. They watched the tiny craft until it vanished round the wooded point which concealed Otter Creek. Then, to add to the sense of loneliness and peace conveyed by the placid bay and the green slopes beyond, a big whale rolled into view in the middle distance, and blew a column of water high in air.

The muffled clang of a hammer broke the silence which had fallen on the watchers from the ship. Walker had slipped back to his beloved engines. Had he not vowed that the massive pistons should again thrust forth their willing arms on or about New Year’s day? He had forgotten the cannibals and their threats ere he was at the foot of the engine-room ladder. Courtenay and Tollemache joined him; Christobal went to the saloon to visit his patients; Elsie was left with Mr. Boyle, who forthwith fell into a doze, being worn out by the fresh air and the excitement.

Joey, having followed Courtenay to the one doorway in the ship which he could not enter, trotted back to find Elsie. She greeted him with enthusiasm.

“Hail, friend,” she said. “You, at least, are not jealous if I speak to your master, wherein you show your exceeding wisdom. Now, since you and I are persons of leisure, tell me, Joey, what we shall do to make ourselves useful?”

The dog was accustomed to being spoken to. He awaited developments.

“It seems to me, Joey,” she continued, “that Gulielmo Frascuelo is the one person on board who claims our attention. There is a mystery to be solved. Bound up in it are my poor Isobel, that beast, Ventana, and a drunken coal-trimmer. An odd assortment to rub shoulders, don’t you think?”

Joey still reserved his opinion. When the girl went to the forecastle by climbing down the sailors’ ladder to the lower deck, he thought she was making a mistake; but she held her arms for his spring, and all was well. She had not previously visited the quarters set apart for the crew. Puzzled by the large number of small cabins with names of subordinate officers painted on them, she paused and cried loudly:

“Are you there, Frascuelo? May I speak to you?”

An exclamation of surprise, a somewhat forcible exclamation, too, answered her from an inner berth. Frascuelo had heard from the Chilean who brought his meals that there was an Englishwoman on board, but he did not know that she spoke Spanish fluently. He answered her question politely enough in the next breath, and the dog indicated the right door by hopping inside.

Frascuelo was reclining on a lower bunk. His injured leg was well on the way towards recovery, but the wound and its resultant confinement had chastened him; he had lost the brigandish swagger which was his most cherished asset.

After acknowledging inquiries as to his progress, he showed such eagerness for news that Elsie told him briefly what had caused the latest uproar. She cheered him, too, with the announcement made by the engineer, and then led him to the topic on which she sought information.

“In some ways, I regard you as most unfortunate,” she said. “I have been told you are here by accident—that you never meant to take the voyage at all. Is that true?”

Frascuelo, delighted to have secured a sympathetic listener, poured forth his sorrows volubly. He bore no ill-will against the captain he said. He knew it was wrong to draw a knife on the chief officer, as his tale was an unlikely one, and he ought to have trusted to a more orderly recital of the facts to obtain credence.

“But I was that mad, seÑorita, I just saw red, and the drink was yet surging up in me. I felt I must fight somebody, whatever the consequences.”

“Can you tell me why any one had such a grievance against you that you should be thrown into the hold and nearly killed? That was a strange thing to do, especially as you came aboard too late for your work.”

“Ah, that is the point, seÑorita. You see, we trimmers work in gangs, and the man who flung me through the hatch was the man who had taken my place. I see no reason to doubt that it was he who made me drunk the previous evening, and I know who did that.”

“What was his name?”

“JosÉ Anacleto—‘JosÉ the Wine-bag’ we call him on the Plaza. I ought to have smelt mischief when JosÉ paid. Never before had I seen him do such a thing. And a good liquor, too. Dios, it must have cost him dollars.”

“What object had he in coming on board instead of you?”

“Ah, there you beat me, seÑorita. I have twisted my poor brain with thinking of that. We only earned a dollar a head, and bunkering a ship from a flat is hard work while it lasts, whereas one would expect JosÉ to ride twenty miles the other way to escape such a task. But he was in the plot, and he shall tell me why, or—”

By force of habit, Frascuelo put his right hand to his belt, but his sheath knife had been taken from him. He smiled sheepishly; yet his black eyes twinkled.

“Plot! Why do you speak of a plot?” asked the girl, hoping that the word betokened some more promising clue than she could discern thus far.

“Why did the furnaces blow up? Tell me that, and I can answer you. Good, honest coal isn’t made of gunpowder. JosÉ, or some one behind him, meant to sink the ship, and, as I might have proved awkward, they were willing that I should go down with her. Maybe I shall meet JosÉ if we get out of this rat-trap; then we shall have a little talk.”

Again his hand wandered towards his waist, but he bethought himself, and bent in pretense that the bandage on his leg needed readjusting.

Despite the man’s shrewd guess as to the cause of the accident in the stoke-hold, Elsie was at a loss to connect the freak of some Valparaiso loafer with the deep-laid scheme which contemplated the destruction of the Kansas. She had followed the discussion in the chart-room with full appreciation of its significance. Valuable as the ship and cargo were, there was far more at stake in the effect of the loss on the copper markets of the world. The most important copper-exporting firm in Chile would practically be ruined, while the Paris “ring,” of which she had read in the newspapers, would have matters its own way. Financial interests of such magnitude would hardly be bound up with the carousals and quarrels of Frascuelo and JosÉ the Wine-bag. Yet—

“Have you ever heard of a SeÑor Pedro Ventana?” she asked suddenly.

“Has he to do with mines?” inquired the Chilean, tentatively.

“Yes.”

“I know him by sight, seÑorita.”

“Would he be acquainted with this man, Anacleto, do you think?”

“Can’t say. JosÉ would know anybody whom he could touch for a few pesetas.”

She left him, promising to visit him daily in the future. As she walked back towards the bridge companion, she met Dr. Christobal. His fit of ill-humor had gone: he was all smiles; but Elsie, having extracted such information as Frascuelo possessed, was bent on adding to her store of knowledge. Incidentally, she meant to widen the doctor’s views.

“Why have you taken to lecturing me?” she asked, with a simple directness which Christobal was not slow to profit by.

“Because, though old enough to be your father, or your elder brother, as you were kind enough to put it, I have not yet reached years of discretion.”

If candor were needed, he would be candid. Sophistry was worse than useless with a woman of Elsie’s type. The only way to win her was to be transparently honest. To Christobal, after an experience of a generation of Chileans, this came as a refreshing novelty.

“You mean, I suppose, that if every one attended to their own affairs it would be a less spiteful world? I am inclined to agree with you. Unhappily, life is largely made up of these minor evils. Yet I should have thought that the desperate conditions under which we exist at this hour might protect me from uncharitableness.”

“You are pleased to be severe.”

“No; it is the last privilege of danger that shams should vanish. Yet we plumb the depths of absurdity when we contest the right of any woman, even a young and unmarried one, to appreciate all that a brave man has done and is doing to save her life.”

Here was candor undiluted. Elsie was speaking without heat. She might have been reasoning some disputed point in ethics. The Spaniard was obviously thrown off his guard.

“You seem to demand an explanation,” he said with some warmth. “Well, you shall have it. I am not a man to flinch from the disagreeable. I admit a sort of impression, I might almost describe it as a conviction, that Captain Courtenay’s manner towards you betokens a growing admiration.”

“This is the wildest folly,” cried Elsie in bewilderment. “I—I cannot imagine what put such a notion into your head.”

“Let me at least lay claim to a species of altruism,” he replied. “I can see fifty excellent reasons why our young and good-looking commander should be drawn to you, nor can I urge one against it.”

“But he is already engaged to another woman, so my one reason is worth more than all your fifty.”

“Ah, can that really be so?”

The tense eagerness in his voice might have warned her, were it not that she was shocked by the bitterness which welled up in her heart. She was amazed by this introspective glimpse; it alarmed her; she must convince herself, at all costs, that she had spoken truly.

Although the evidence she tendered was of dubious value, she strove to advance her argument further.

“I have prized our friendship greatly, Dr. Christobal,” she said, speaking with a calm deliberateness that rang hollow in her own ears, “so greatly that I am compelled to utter this protest. Now, to end a distasteful controversy, let me tell you what I know to be true. When the ship was stranded, and we all thought our only chance of safety was to take to the boats, by a fluke, the accident of the moment, I was left alone in the captain’s cabin. The sea was breaking in through the doorway, and it brought an odd relief to my over-burthened mind when I endeavored to rescue the contents of a locker which, for some reason, had been scattered on the floor previously. Among them I found some letters. I think you will believe me when I say that I would not consciously read another person’s private correspondence. Just then, I was hardly responsible for my actions, and I did happen to see and grasp the meaning of a passage in a letter from Captain Courtenay’s sister which alluded to his affianced wife. It is not such a tragic admission, is it? I would scarce have given it another thought were it not for your manner this morning and your words last night. I paid no heed at the time to the innuendo that I had come on deck to find him—to waylay him, as I have heard men say when speaking of a type of woman I despise. So I resolved to straighten out a stupid little tangle. It would be ridiculous, in our present state of suspended animation, to let such a slight thing mar our friendship.”

Elsie, was indulging in that most delusive thing, self-persuasion. It was not surprising, therefore, that she failed to note the unmixed satisfaction with which Christobal listened.

“Am I forgiven, then?” he asked, with a new tenderness in his voice.

“Oh, yes, let us laugh at it.”

“But—”

“Please let us talk of something more useful. I have a little plan, and you might ask the captain if he approves of it. We have plenty of strong canvas; what do you say if I set to work and cover in the promenade deck, fore and aft as well as on both sides? Then, if the Indians try to seize the ship, they would not be able to gain a lodgment at so many points simultaneously. It would simplify the defense, so to speak.”

“Admirable! I am sure Courtenay will agree. Indeed, I am ashamed that we superior males failed to hit on the idea earlier. Before I go, let me be certain that my forgiveness is complete?”

“Shall we quarrel about a degree of blessedness? I assure you I like you more than ever. When all is said and done, you thought I was flinging myself at our excellent captain’s head, so you tried to spare me the pangs of unrequited love.” The words hurt, but she did not flinch. Christobal, anxious to deceive himself, was radiant.

“Your charity goes too far,” he cried. “That was not the exact reason. No, my dear Miss Maxwell, I begin to exercise a new-born discretion. I shall not elucidate that cryptic remark until after New Year’s Day. But I don’t mind telling you why I have hit on a definite date. If all goes well with us—and we have had so many escapes that Providence may well send us a few more—the Kansas should steam out of our little bay of Good Hope about that period. Then I shall remind you of our discussion, and keep my promise.”

With that he left her. After a gasp or two of surprise, for Elsie could read only one meaning into his words, she hurried up the bridge companion to arouse Mr. Boyle and ask what he would like for luncheon.

“Thank goodness, Joey,” she murmured to the dog, whom she picked up in her arms, “thank goodness, Mr. Boyle is neither an engaged man nor a widower. I do believe our excellent doctor is more concerned on his own account than on mine. And he said that your master’s manner ‘betokened a growing admiration.’ I wish—no, Joey, I mean nothing of the sort, and if you dare to hint at such a thing I shall be very angry with you—very—angry—indeed.”

“Huh,” muttered Boyle, wide awake and watching her through the open door, “some one has been worryin’ that girl. It’s a sure sign of trouble when a woman whispers in the ear of a dog or cat. Now, who can it be? That doctor chap? He cocked his eye at her this mornin’ when she spoke about Ventana. He’s a pretty tough old bird to think about settin’ up house with a nice young jenny wren. Damn his eyes! he may be as rich as a Jew, but if she doesn’t want him, an’ is too skeered to say so, I’ll tell him, in the right sort of Spanish, an’ all. Now, had it been the skipper—”

Boyle hardly knew what to think—“had it been the skipper.”